1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to vehicle systems and networks, such as railway systems including trains travelling in a track or rail network, and in particular to data storage and management systems and methods for use in connection with one or more data sources or inputs, such as event recording systems and associated devices, used on or in connection with one or more locomotives or railcars of a train.
2. Description of Related Art
Vehicle systems and networks exist throughout the world, and, at any point in time, a multitude of vehicles, such as cars, trucks, buses, trains, and the like, are travelling throughout the system and network. Many of these vehicles are equipped with various target devices that measure, determine, and/or track certain conditions, parameters, operational states, physical data or information, and the like. For example, a train may include an event recorder and/or other components or devices that measure, determine, and/or track certain conditions or states of the equipment of the train, such as pressure, temperature, speed, operational states, and the like, and/or conditions or states of the areas or environment in or around the train. These devices are normally attached to or associated with one or more of the locomotives of a train. Further, in another example, such event recorders and/or other components or devices are attached to or associated with a truck, a bus, or other vehicle where the conditions and states of certain pieces of equipment are or should be tracked.
With respect to railway systems, and as is known, train event recorders and recording systems receive and store train event data from a train management system and/or other components and systems of a locomotive, railcar, track network, wayside equipment, end-of-train unit, head-of-train device unit, and the like, where this information and data relate to the operating conditions or states of the train, of the area in the train, of the area or environment around the train, and the like. Train event recording systems are designed to be crash-worthy and include crash-resistant housings to preserve the recorded train event data in the event of a crash, derailment, or other type of accident.
Train event recorders and recording systems may provide download or transfer options to facilitate the transfer of train event data to one or more external storage devices. In addition, the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA), such as at 49 C.F.R. §229, requires train event recording systems to comply with basic specifications, such as the crash-worthiness of the memory, although the capabilities of these systems can be enhanced beyond these requirements. To be in compliance, all leading locomotives of trains in the United States that travel faster than 30 miles per hour on a United States rail network must have crash-worthy event recording systems that record certain safety-critical events needed for investigating an accident.
Train event recording systems may monitor a variety of analog and digital outputs from the train management computer, directly from certain target devices that output data and information, and/or from other equipment and sources. Various existing train event recording systems and train management systems are shown and described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 7,965,312; 7,593,963; 8,420,930; 5,185,700; 7,703,291; and 6,795,759; U.S. Publication Nos.: 2003/0222981; 2011/0216200; 2006/0244830; 2003/0081121; and 2003/0081127; and Publication Nos.: WO 2007064671; WO 2008144163; and WO 2008005620.